Transcripts For CNNW At This Hour With Kate Bolduan 20170612

CNNW At This Hour With Kate Bolduan June 12, 2017

Confidence in Jeff Sessions, and its really a tough question, and i think when you look at it, you have to ask yourself, do they also have confidence in Rod Rosenstein . This is the same man who youll remember appointed this special counsel. So, clearly, if sessions were to resign at one point, you would then have that man in that position. Unclear at this point in thats what the white house really wants. Youll also have to remember, sessions, though, his relationship with the president may have soured, but you also have to remember, he still has supporters here in the west wing. You look at people like steve bannon, stephen miller, who are definitely still, at least still as far as we know still in sessions court. So, he still has some support here in the west wing, but the optics of the meeting of those two men at that Cabinet Meeting is going to be something to behold. Kate . Something to behold. Lets see what he hear coming out of that. Great to see you, jason. Thank you so much. Now to a big decision that just suddenly fell into the senates lap. Will he or wont he . Whether they will allow the attorney general to testify behind closed doors, or will they require and demand that it be before cameras and the public . Cnns Suzanne Malveaux is joining me from capitol hill with much more on this. Suzanne, word is that sessions caught folks off guard with his offer to testify, so what exactly do we know about this . Reporter he did, kate. And you would think that, of course, they want to see him before the committee. It would be a nobrainer, right . But there is a lot of debate thats taking place behind the scenes. The reason why here is that the head of the committee, Senate Intelligence committee, richard burr, he believes that, yes, this is a good idea, but the debate that theyre having, the democrat on this committee, mark warner, believes that this could be a strategy by sessions to avoid a public hearing, to go ahead before this committee. He offered it in this letter on saturday, but to do it quietly behind the scenes, and they believe that he needs to have this kind of public hearing to be held accountable. So, that is the debate thats taking place. They are getting some advice, if you will, from the special counsel. Bob muellers going to be meeting with him through the week. There are going to be discussions, ongoing discussions, about what is the most appropriate way to have him go before this committee, if it is this committee at all, and in what forum. The other thing thats happening is that the Senate Judiciary committee, also investigating the russia probe here, they are trying to create a sense of urgency in getting their hands on those comey memos from comeys friend, law professor daniel richmond, who comey was handing over his notes to during a time, richmond slipping it to the media and exposing the kinds of conversations he was having with President Trump at the time. They gave him a friday deadline, and cnn has learned that, yes, he is cooperating with that particular committee. There should be some movement on that sometime today to see whether or not they actually physically get those memos, copies of those memos, in what form they would get that. But that is something they, too, want in earnest. So theres a lot, kate, that is going on here on capitol hill, and clearly, they are trying to create this sense of urgency in getting this information in their hands. I think theres urgency all around, we could say. Great to see you, suzanne. Thank you so much. Reporter great to see you. I want to bring in cnns political director, david chalian. David, im going to look down four just one second because we are getting news in about Jeff Sessions and the possibility and schedule of him testifying. Im going to read this as were all getting it. Laura jarrett sent this in from a Justice Department spokesman saying sessions has requested a public Senate Intelligence hearing for tomorrow, and heres a quote from a spokesman for doj he believes it is important for the American People to hear the truth directly from him and looks forward to answering the committees questions tomorrow. This is a fascinating chain of events, david. It is. Clearly, i think sessions was aware that if he was going to cancel his publicly scheduled testimony, remember, before the appropriations committees about the doj budget, which is what he was supposed to be doing this week. Right. And then say i want to testify before senate intel, if he was then to go behind closed doors, he would have caught a lot of flack for that, obviously, as would have his republican colleagues on senate intel, if they allowed that. Well see. We still have to hear, of course, from the senate intel chair and vice chair. Thats right. But hearing from the attorney general that he would like it to be public, i think it would be surprising if senator burr and senator warner did not certainly agree to that and make that happen here. This is now welcome to the hot seat in washington, right . Yeah, i guess so. This is the seat that jim comey was before last week. He was sitting in this before the senate intel committee, and now if Jeff Sessions is there publ publicly. Kate, i think there are three different Big Questions Jeff Sessions would have to answer in this. One, jim comey said that when the president cleared the oval office on february 14th, that you were lingering behind, as if you didnt want to leave. Well, what was going through your mind, ag sessions . Did you not think it appropriate for the president to be in a oneonone meeting with the fbi director . Were you concerned that he was going to bring up the Flynn Investigation . What was going through your mind there . Thats one. Two, you saw chuck schumer, the Senate Minority leader, yesterday bring up this notion of why are you writing a memo to the president recommending comeys firing, that the president has said russia was on his mind when making that firing, if you recused yourself . Did the recusal why did that not cause you to recuse yourself from the firing of the fbi director over this issue . And three, was there a third meeting you had with the Russian Ambassador to the u. S. Right. Kislyak at the Mayflower Hotel . Was there a side meeting . Because initially, Jeff Sessions, youll recall, disclosed no meetings with the Russian Ambassador, then disclosed two, and this is what caused him to recuse himself from the whole russia investigation. He had to update his testimony before the Senate Judiciary committee for his confirmation hearing, saying i did actually meet with the Russian Ambassador. And now theres this question about whether or not there was a third meeting. So, lots of questions for Jeff Sessions to answer. Absolutely. And you lay it out perfectly, the big ones that he will most definitely be getting, if this all happens. As you say, very important to note, yet to hear from the chair and vice chair of the Senate Intelligence committee, if theyre ready to schedule this hearing. Theres a lot of preparation that goes into these hearings before they have a big witness like this, and they came very fast and caught a lot of folks off guard. Interesting to see if theyll try to delay or if they will move ahead with something of a public hearing tomorrow. Stand by for that. Let me ask you another big thing thats going on today, david. Youre getting it all. Apologies, my friend. No problem. Were seeing more of the president s supporters going after special prosecutor Robert Mueller, people like Newt Gingrich. Gingrich sent out a tweet this morning and it kind of took off like wildfire, when he wrote this republicans are delusional if they think the special counsel is going to be fair. Look who he is hiring. Check fec reports. Time to rethink. Add to that, heres what the president s one of the president s lawyers said yesterday when he was asked about the potential of mueller being fired by the president. Will the president promise not to interfere, not attempt at any time to order the Deputy Attorney general to fire Robert Mueller . Look, the president of the United States, as we all know, its a unitary executive, but the president is going to seek the advice of his counsel, and inside the government as well as outside, and im not going to speculate on what he will or will not do. I cant imagine that that issues going to arise, but that, again, is an issue that the president with his advisers would discuss, if there was a basis. So, you have that from jay sekulow, but on the Newt Gingrich bit, this is the same Newt Gingrich who tweeted in may that he liked the mueller announcement, saying it was a superb choice. What gives here . Whats changed . Well, you know, he clearly thought when mueller got appointed that that would be sort of an alleviator of pressure for the white house, saying, okay, now everybody can calm down because this is in the hands of a special counsel, and let that process go forward. Now, after seeing reporting about the team that muellers put together, i think gingrich is now trying to discredit not just mueller, or not so much going after mueller, but after the entire investigative effort that the special counsels put together. Heres the problem, kate, i think its going to be very hard to make this kind of strategy work, and perhaps thats why were not hearing it from republicans on the hill, but its more sort of these trump surrogates and fans outside right now. And thats because even ken starr this morning, kate right. Was saying bob mueller is uniy peachable, amazing kreblz. He was praising the legal team muellers put together. I think it will be stunning for somebody with the credentials mueller has, if republicans will try to discredit him as part of the political portion of this campaign. And even if it comes from the outside, what kind of position would that put republicans in, as example after example, tweet, sound bite, issued statement of them calling his credentials impeachable, impeccable, that he is a straight shooter, and you know, a fair guy . It would put republicans, republican lawmakers in a tough spot. In a very tough spot. And as would, obviously, which is what sekulow was responding to in that bite you played, this notion of if donald trump somehow directed right. The firing of the special counsel, you could imagine that would just create such a firestorm. Now, sekulow said he doesnt expect that situation to arise, but he did not rule it out, because as you know, the special counsel is still, though independent, in the chain of command. The president does certainly have that ability. Its within his right. It just would be political suicide. All right. Youre the best, david stand by. Thank you so much. Thank you. I do want to bring in weve got more to discuss with this breaking news that Jeff Sessions has requested a public hearing with the Senate Intelligence committee. We have now learned that Jeff Sessions hold on, let me make sure i pull this up correctly, because its just coming in, and i want to make sure i get it. We are getting this from the Senate Intelligence committee now, saying that attorney general Jeff Sessions will testify at the Senate Intelligence committee tomorrow. That is news. So, weve now heard it from Jeff Sessions says he wanted it to be public, and we are getting this in from the chairman of the Senate Intelligence committee, that they will have that hearing for him tomorrow. On this, let me bring in right now former Nixon White House counsel john dean. Whats your reaction to this news, that this new addition i mean it was going to be all eyes were on james comey last week, and now it seems all eyes are on Jeff Sessions, and this breaking news right now that Jeff Sessions will be testifying in a public setting tomorrow before the Senate Intelligence committee to answer all of these questions. I think its going to be a tough setting, but its a friendly setting. Sessions has a lot of friends on the hill. He was a very popular senator, worked quietly behind closed doors with his colleagues and got along well with them. So, i think it will be friendly, but i think its important also that he get this behind him sooner rather than later, given his strained relationship with the white house, and a big factor that no ones talking about is there are about 200 unappointed president ial posted in the department of justice that are vacant right now, and the pool of lawyers is small to start with for these kinds of jobs and they dont like these jobs when theyre in the spotlight. So, its important sessions get these hearings behind him and get the department working. What do you think . I mean, one of the Big Questions, of course, john, is going to be that february 14th meeting when that james comey described in such detail about the grandfather clock and the president asking Jeff Sessions to leave, Jeff Sessions lingering, him telling him to leave, Jared Kushner lingering, the president telling him to leave. Im sure hes going to ask for his detailbydetail, playbyplay of exactly what his view of that meeting was. I think youre absolutely right. Hes obviously heard comeys testimony. He will have his recollection of it. I think the more interesting answer will be what motivated him to leave his fbi director there alone when the fbi director asked him not to do that. Didnt he want to raise it with the president that it might not be appropriate to meet with this man . Do you want to give this a Second Thought . And hes also one of the president s lawyers. Hes by tradition the president s lawyer. So, well all be anxious to hear what he has to say about this. Let me also ask you about one other thing thats kind of lingering out there when you talk about a lot of questions right now. It comes down to the tapes, john. I know ive asked you this a couple times before, but for our viewers i think its nice to remind of where things left, where are there taped conversations that took place in the oval office or not . Heres a reminder of what the president said just on friday. Listen to this. And you seem to be hinting that there are recordings of those conversations im not hinting anything. Ill tell you about it over a very short period of time, okay . Okay. Do you have a question here . When will you tell us about the recordings . Over a fairly short period of time. Why wont you tell us now . Are there tapes, sir . Oh, youre going to be very disappointed when you hear the answer. Dont worry. The more he drags this along, do you think it is more likely there are tapes, john, or more likely there are not . I think more likely there are not. I think his telephone system has the capability of recording by hitting a switch, where the voice mail can become a recording for the conversation. As to the oval office and where they had dinner, the small dining room they ate in, hed have to have used Something Like his cell phone to make that recording. Ive read that he has done that in the past in business meetings, so maybe its a very poor quality, where he tried to do it and it didnt work very well. So, who knows. And i dont understand his answer that you will know in a very short period of time. I mean, its just odd. Its a little bit of playing reality president. Let us drag this on a little bit and build up a little more interest in it. Strange stuff. Do you see a benefit in that . No, not at all. I dont see anything, any wisdom in what hes doing in playing these kinds of games and not answering these questions. It just prolongs his problems. If it plays with his base, his base is more interested in entertainment than they are in governing. Great to see you, john. Always great to have your perspective. Thanks so much. Coming up for us, an interesting moment. Were going to hear how cnn accidentally, it appears, reached james comey. Yes, the former fbi director on the phone. It is quite a story. Youre going to hear what he told one of our cnn correspondents about this. Plus, one highprofile senator says American Leadership was better under president obama. Thats not from a democrat. Its from obamas former opponent, republican john mccain. Hear why he said that. And breaking news from the trial of bill cosby. His defense abruptly resting its case today after just an hour. Hear the only witness that they called. Thats ahead. To homes than anyone else in the country, we never forget. That your business is our business the United States postal service. Priority you how to win at business. Step one point decisively with the arm of your glasses. Abracadabra. The stage is yours. Step two choose la quinta. The only hotel where you can redeem loyalty points for a free nightinstantly and win at business. Deartheres no other way to say this. Its over. 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